Trell by Dick Lehr (review)

Trell Taylor's father has been serving a life sentence for the murder of a neighborhood teen since Trell was a baby, but the now fourteen-year-old girl is convinced of his innocence. An introduction to the attorney of a fellow inmate gives Mr. Taylor new hope for overturning his conviction, but even lawyer Nora Walsh's best efforts fail to convince a judge to reopen the case. With Trell interning in Walsh's office, they decide that the last best hope is to appeal to the press to investigate the case and follow a trail of evidence left unexamined at the original trial. To that end Trell hounds reporter Clemens Bittner, who years before had had similar success in another wrongful conviction. Bittner isn't exactly down on his heels, but he has definitely lost his spark working the graveyard shift since his own child died. Persistent Trell gets him back in the game, though, and together they track down witnesses and uncover a cabal involving a shady cop, a crooked D.A., and a crime lord who conspired to frame Taylor for the fatal shooting. The feisty young lawyer, idealistic, loyal teen, and scruffy reporter in need of redemption sometimes feel more like tropes than fleshed characters, but author Lehr, himself an investigative reporter for the Boston Globe, found the inspiration for this novel in the true story of a wrongful conviction, and his meticulously drawn procedural elements are unsensationalized and convincing. Recommend this to readers not quite ready to tackle season one of the Serial podcast.